Rating: 
Summary: as u like it!!
Review: This book was one of my best loved Shakespeare's plays. It really gave me comfort and laugh whenever I read it. I hope in real lifre I can find a forest like the one in the play so I can hide my self there and live "as I like it". Rosaind is the best female character in the literature for her sense of humour and intelligence, and passion. Orlando reminds all those who ever loved of their first love, the bittersweet and compelling passion that one is not capable of getting rid of. If you had spare time, you really should read this play, I guarantee the language in this play is not that hard and you will find yourself so into this fantastic tale once you started reading it.
Rating: 
Summary: An Idyllic play - for romantics
Review: This has to be one of Shakespeare's gayest plays (no pun intended). Whatever tragedy may have occurred in the beginning - at the court - is totally forgotten when the action moves to the forest, where Robin-hood like; a banished duke, a melancholy philosopher and a cast of love sick characters act out their lives on the stage. Much of the play is centered on Rosalind - the female lead in 'drag' - who falls in love with the third son of a nobleman, Orlando, who has been cheated out of his inheritance by his eldest brother. Her father, the duke, has also been cheated by a brother and is now living in the forest with his 'merry men'. Her short stay at court is disrupted when her uncle changes his mind about her and 'graciously' gives her a few days to get out of the kingdom. This event leads to her escape into the forests with her cousin, the daughter of the duke at Court. As the play progresses more and more characters end up in the forest which becomes the stage where all these actors play out their parts - to paraphrase Jacques. As a reader you sometimes have to suspend rationality in order to swallow some of the larger than life events that occur in this story (The snake - Lion - Lion killer scene for example). It's not meant to be taken too seriously I'd imagine, just a play about love and romance and the lengths one will go to because of love. The only rational person in this play seems to be the Malvolio-like Jacques, whose deer hugging antiques (forerunner of modern day Environmentalism?) and refusal to take part in the revelry make him the butt of the other's jokes. Even the clown seems to have been pierced by Cupid's arrows as he too weds a country 'wench', something unheard of in the other plays where the clowns all seem to be eunuchs. If you're reeling from any of Shakespeare's tragedies, or want to escape the ordered, (courtly?) existence that is your life and take a dive into an almost fantasy-like world where all is love and laughter, this play may be your ticket.
Rating:
Summary: darn fine, dirt cheap
Review: Whew...this story has an even faster plot turn about than Austen's Pride and Prejudice. If one is not careful, you--like me, may suffer "plausibility whiplash." That said, As You Like It is a delightful example of Shakespearean comedy. Jaques is one of my favorites from Shakespeare's stable of characters. Things get renewed, folks get married, fortunes are restored. Good Stuff. I must also mention how much I like these Signet Classic Shakespeare texts. They are darn fine (good intros, critical pieces, and source info) and dirt cheap.
| 
